Observing the Neglected----Four Essays on Still Life

Author: [British] Norman Bryson
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2000-03-01
Features: From a historical and cultural perspective, the group of artists who create still-life paintings is almost unimaginably diverse. So, what allows us to classify such varied images into the same category? Norman Bryson argues that the family resemblance between different types of still-life paintings stems from their fundamental depiction of a certain level of material culture, which, over the long course of history and across different regions of national cultures, broadly shares similar outlines, manifesting as daily life and hospitality customs. The central theme of this book is how to historically approach this "low-level reality" and how it is shaped by the surrounding "high-level" cultural layers and their discourse. Bryson's concise, penetrating, and effortlessly flowing prose will captivate both professional scholars and readers with a general interest in art.